Butter-blocking machine.



PATENTED DEG. "5,1905.

0. G, WILSON. BUTTER BLOCKING MACHINE.

APPLICATION IILED APR. 20.1905;

A ll witnesses MM TTNITED' sTATEs PATENT- OFFICE.

CARLOS e. wiLsoN, on ATLANTA, GEORGIA. [BUTTER-BLOCKING MACHINE.

a To all whom it may concern:

'Be it known that I, OARLos G. Wnson, a

' citizen of the United States, residing in Atlanta, county of Fulton, and State of Georgia, have invented certain new and useful Improve:

- ments in Butter-Blocking Machines, of which the following is a specification. V

My invention relates to a machine that may i be run by hand for the purpose of blocking butter for individual use or may. be made of larger proportions and adapted to be run by power for the purpose of blocking butter in suitable sizes to besold at retail.

reference to the accompanying drawings, inwh1ch- Figure 1 is a perspective view of the com-.

. plete machine. Fig. 2 is a section on the line i 2 2, Fig. 1,'1ooking toward the right. 2

Fig. 3 is-a detail view of the key for holding the screw against rotation, but permitting it to be moved axially by the feed-nut.

Projecting upward from a suitable base 1' I are standards 2 3, of any suitable construction,

having open bearings 4 at their upper ends to receive the studs 5 of the barrel 6. Said bar:

rel being thus removably mounted in the standards may be conveniently charged with butter and replaced in the standards.- Detachably secured to its forward end is the discharge-nozzle 7. This .nozzle is shown with forward by a nut 11.

i a square section; but it may obviously be of any other shape which it is desired to impart to the butter. Butter placed in the barrel 6 4ov ger 8, under control of a feed-screw 9, which is expressed through the nozzle 7 by a plunhas sliding bearing in a standardlO and is fed As the butter issues from the nozzle 7 it. is severed in blocks or cakes by a cutter 12, which passes the mouth of the nozzle at periods bearing a relation to the flow of butter proportionalto the sizeof I mit the screw to be-run back rapidly for withdrawing the plunger 8 when it is desired to i remove barrel 6, (either for recharging-orthe cakes desired. 7

To provide a simple and efficient means for feeding the screw andat the. same time to perfor placing it with its contained 'butter in a refrigerator,) the nut 11 is divided diametric-j 1 ally and its parts connected by a' hinge' 13,",

Specification of Letters Patent. Application filed April 20, 1905. Serial No. 256,647.

Patented Dede, 1905. i

Fig. 2, while pins 14:, projecting from the respective halves of the nut, enter cam-slots 15 in an opening. and closing disk 16, which has a rotary bearing 17 on the screw 9.

When the disk 16' is rotated to the left in Fig. 2, the halves of the nut are closed around the screw 9, so that the internal threads in the nut mesh with the external threads of the screw, and rotation of the nut will thereafter feed the screw. If, however, the disk 16 is rotated to the right in Fig. 2, its cam-groove 16 will separate the pinslii and open the nut,

so that: the screw is then free to move axially independently of the nut. To impart rotation to the nut and at the same time to support it without providing additional bearings,

a worm-wheel 18 is mounted on the screw 9 through a 'plain turning bearing, and the halves of the nut are. secured to one of the spokes of the wheel by means of thepintle of the hinge 13, as shown in Fig. 2. Wheel 18 abuts against the standard 10, so as to feed the screw in the direction to express the butter from the barrel. Worm-wheel 18 is ro-" tatedby the worm 19, having bearings 20 in the upwardly-extending arm 21 on the standard 10. A key 22, secured to the bearingboss 23 of the standard 10, enters a slot'24iof the screw 9 and prevents said screw from turning with its nut, while permitting it to move freely inan axial direction under the influence of said nut. When the nut is supported as already described, the screw may berun back rapidly by a pinion 25, meshing with the thread of screw 9 and journaled in the bracket 26 on standard 10, said pinion being' rotated in any suitable manner, as by a crank 27 Worm 19 is shown, equipped with a crank 28 for rotating it; but in machines constructed of suflicient capacityv to produce pound and half-poundblocksof butter this crank-arm would preferably be replaced by a band-wheel that could be driven from suitable source of power. Crank 27 could likewise be replaced by means for driving the pinion from the same source of power, fastand loose pulleys being employed, so as to arrest the rotation of the running-back pinion at will.

a To avoid mutilating the blocks of butter severed by the cutter 12, the frame 29 for saidcutter is bent forwardly, as shown at 30, a'distance equal at least to the thickness of "the block to be cut, and to revolve the cutter past the mouth of the discharge-nozzle the cutter is made to project at right angles from,

a short shaft 31, mounted in a bearing 32, which may be conveniently carried by a standard 2, and said shaft is connected by a gimbal-joint'33, with a downwardly-inclined shaft 34, which carries a specially-toothed pinion 35 at its lower rear end, that meshes with a larger pinion 36 on shaft 37, journaled in bearing 38. Said shaft 37 also carries a spirally-toothed pinion 39, that meshes with and is driven by the worm-wheel 18. Shaft 34 is supported in a bearing 40, trunnioned at 41 in a bifurcated post 42, fitted in a socket 43, and held at any suitable height in said socket by a set-screw 44. Pinion 35 is removable and replaceable by other pinions of different diameters, and the vertical adjustment of the supporting-post 42 provides for bringing into mesh with the multiplying-pinion 36 any pinion 35 that may be placed upon the shaft 34. By this interchange of pinions the cutting period of cutter 12 may be varied at will relatively to the rate at which butter is expressed from the nozzle 7 and the size of the blocks cut off thus regulated at will.

Butter havinga high coefficient of pressibility must be fed constantly if it is desired to have the severed blocks uniform in size and weight. It must also be expressed with considerable rapidity. By my improved construction of machine I am enabled to express the butter with ample rapidity and to maintain such accuracy in the relation of the cutting period to the rate of issue of the butter from the nozzle as to insure substantial uniformity in the weight and size of the blocks, and this enables me to utilize my machine for preparing butter for the market, where it is necessary that the blocks accurately correspond to a definite weight.

The open bearing 4 of the front and rear standards 2 3 are each constructed on an arc concentric withthe stud that enters the other bearing, so that longitudinal thrust or pull upon the barrel 6 in either direction will have no tendency to displace the barrel from its seats, but either end may yield slightly to avoid transverse strain upon the feed-screw if there is any inaccuracy in centering the barrel with the screw, and when it is desired to remove the barrel after the plunger 8 is Withdrawn the barrel may be swung on either pair of pins as a center until the other pair are out of their bearings, after which the barrel may be entirely lifted from the machine. The importance of having the barrel readily movable and replaceable will be appreciated when it is remembered that for producing small blocks for hotel or household use it may frequently be desired to remove the barrel with a large proportion of its contained butter and place it bodily in a refrigerator to preserve the butter until it is desired to separate more of it into blocks for individul use, and when the machine is used on a larger scale for making blocks for the market it may be desirable to have a number of barrels 6 for a given machine, one being filled and packed while another is in the machine having the butter expressed from it.

7 I do not limit myself to the precise details of construction herein shown and described, but desire it to be understood that various modifications might be made without departing from the scope of my present invention. While I prefer the worm-gear for driving the nut in a large machine where the speed of rotation of the worm can be regulated at will, I reserve the right to employ a gear-wheel for rotating the wheel 18 instead of the worm 19, it being obvious that this could be readily arranged by merely rotating the shaft 20 ninety degrees and bringing it parallel with the screw upon which the wheel 18 turns. This would be desirable in those cases where the capacity of the barrel 6 would admit of expressing the butter more rapidly from the nozzle 7. To take advantage of this increase in the feed of the butter, the cutter 12 could be duplicated so that two cutting strokes would be secured instead of one.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

1. In combination with a butter-blocking machine in which the butter is expressed from the barrel, a cutter having a cutting stroke past the discharge end of the barrel, a cuttershaft mounted substantially parallel to the axis of the barrel, a transmitting-shaft connected to the cutter-shaft by a flexible joint and a reduction-gear connected with the rear end of the transmitting-shaft; said rear end of the transmitting-shaft having a verticallyadjustable support whereby the shaft may swing on its flexibly-jointed end, transversely to its axis, and one of the elements of the reduction-gear being interchangeable to determine the speed of rotation transmitted through said shaft.

2. In combination with a butter-blocking machine having a plunger for expressing butter therefrom, acutter havinga cutting stroke past the end of the discharge end of the machine, a driving mechanism for the plunger, means for operating the cutter from said driving mechanism, consisting of the reductiongear receiving motion from said driving mechanism, a transmitting-shaft carrying one element of said reduction-gear and having a flexible connection with the cutter whereby it may swing laterally to permit the use of different-sized gears in the reduction-gear, and a support for said transmitting-shaft comprising a sleeve in which the shaft rotates, a bifurcated post in which said sleeve is trunnioned and a socket in which said post is fitted and in which it is adjustable'in a direction to swing the transmitting-shaft on its flexible oint.

3. In a butter-blocking machine, the combination of the barrel, the plunger, the feedscrew, a standard in which the feed-screw has a non-rotating but sliding bearing, a nut surrounding and meshing with the feed-screw, a worm-wheel'rotatable upon the screw, abutting the standard, and connected to thenut by means which prevents relative rotation 5. In a butter-blocking machine, the combination of the barrel, the plunger, the screw, the nut for advancing the screw, the gear for rotatingthe but, the cutter moving past the discharge end of the barrel, the cutter-shaft, the transmitting-shaft for rotating the cutter-shaft, connected therewith through a universal joint, the multiplying-gear through which the transmitting-shaft is driven interchangeable to regulate the speed of the cutter, and means through'which said multiplying-gear. is driven from the gear which rotates the nut.

The foregoing specification signed at Washington, District of Columbia, this 7th day'of April, 1905.,

CARLOS e. WILSONQ V In presence of,

HERVEY S KNIGHT, EDWIN S, OLARKsoN. 

